A Brief Guide to Getting Started with Online Dating

I get asked about my online dating experiences a lot, so I figured I’d write up a post with some information and resources to help ladies who want to try it for themselves! Over the past 10 years, the majority of my romantic partners have been men I’ve met online in some capacity. Ever since Black Planet, the internet has been a great way for me to meet men who have the same interests as I do right off the bat instead of purely going off of physical appearance. I met my ex-fiancé K on Yahoo Personals. I met the rocket scientist on Match.com. I go on dates pretty frequently with great guys that I meet online. Granted, not everyone is going to be comfortable with online dating, but if you do want to try it out for yourself as a way to expand your relationship options, this guide may give you some useful tips.

But first, we gotta clear up some of the myths out there about online dating. Let’s start with the main one – that only losers and psychopaths go online to find love. Not true!

“This is the idea that online dating is for people who just can’t get a date in real life — because they’re unattractive, have poor social skills or are otherwise undesirable,” explains Shannon Fox, author of Last One Down the Aisle Wins. The truth, however, is that “the majority of people who seek love online are successful in careers that don’t afford them the luxury of lots of free time to meet people, and others prefer online dating because they’re more particular about the people they choose to date and want a chance to eliminate unlikely candidates,” says Fox. One point to consider, though: since virtually all singles nowadays try online dating at some point, a small proportion are still going to be those proverbial “losers” — people whom you’d still meet (and even get set up on dates with) in real life.

Here are some other facts that I often point out to my fellow sisters who are on the fence about trying online dating.

• Online dating is just another method of meeting potential partners. If your current strategies aren’t working for you, maybe it’s time to try something new! You don’t lose anything by putting yourself out there – in fact, you can only gain from the experience if you find someone great.
• The same men you meet online are the same ones you’d meet at the club, library, church or grocery store. I’ve met guys at different social events here in DC and later spotted their dating profile online. Seriously – 1 in 5 singles have dated someone they met on a dating site, so it’s not a new phenomenon.
• 1 in 6 marriages are now between people who met through an online dating site – more than twice the number of people meeting at bars, at clubs and other social events combined. It’s truly now a mainstream way of meeting romantic partners.

Online Dating Sites I Recommend

This is the question people ask me the most – what dating sites do I use? After experimenting quite a bit with different online dating sites over the years, I have a few favorites that I’ll highlight here. Now of course, this is only MY experience (the problem with any dating “advice” is that the results may vary from person to person) but I’ve gotten most of my dates from these and the quality of matches are better than on other sites, in my opinion.

OK Cupid

OK Cupid has quickly become my favorite dating site. The men on there don’t take themselves too seriously (I rarely see anyone talking about marriage or how educated/well-traveled/important they are). The matching process is sort of wacky, though, so I really don’t pay much attention to it – I just judge based on the profiles themselves. In comparison to sites like Match.com and eHarmony, there are more blue-collar men on the site, which to me adds more of a variety in terms of potential dates. And it’s totally free!

Match.com (7-day free trial)

Match.com is probably the most recognizable  name out of all the sites. They have a pretty good system of allowing you to search by many different variables. The profiles are easy to read and see if you have anything in common with your potential dates. In my experience, there are a lot of white collar, professional men on the site, many of them marriage-minded. The service typically costs about $20 a month.

eHarmony 

This is the most time-consuming of all the dating sites. The service takes you through an extensive questionnaire process in order to find accurate matches for you. In my experience, there are a lot of different types of men on the site, with many of them being very marriage-minded. The service typically costs $60 a month, but you can easily do a Google search for coupon codes and bring your costs down to $20 a month.

PlentyOfFish.com

Plenty of Fish is a huge (and hugely popular) dating site that’s always free! I spent a few months on there and quickly got overwhelmed with the sheer number of men on the site. If you’ve got a halfway decent profile, you will likely be indundated with messages, simply because it is such a large site. Like OK Cupid, their matching system seems hit or miss, so I mainly go by what people say in their profile. There are a lot of different types of men here as well.

Craigslist

Yes, you can find both furniture and love on Craigslist! My mom met her husband Kurt on there. It’s also totally free. Out of all the dating sites, however, Craigslist is the most explicit in terms of men looking for mainly casual sex and not much else. A lot of female dating scammers frequent the site, so men are often wary of you until they’re convinced that you’re a “real person” which can be annoying. I consider this a site where you have to either find the “diamond in the rough” OR even better: post your own ad and sit back and have your pick! The last time I posted a personals ad on Craigslist, I got back 70 responses.

Honorable Mentions

Black Singles

Black People Meet

These sites are obviously specific to black men and women. Both will run you about $10 a month and both pretty active, meaning you will get a LOT of response to your profile, but you have to weed through these a bit more to find quality matches. Personally, I find that a huge percentage of the men on these two sites have kids (in many cases, several kids) and since I prefer not to date men with kids, I don’t find many matches. In my opinion, however, the men on both of these sites tend to be WAY more attractive than the ones on the mainstream sites.

How to Write Your Online Dating Profile

This is the part people have the most trouble with. It’s sort of like putting together a job application LOL.

• Upload at least two good photos of yourself (smiling!). At least one showing your face up close and at least one full body shot. If you don’t have any photos of yourself that you like, take some!
• Fill in your profile completely. Answer all the questions. Be specific about what YOU want or else you’ll get anything and everything.
• Focus more on your likes than dislikes. No one likes to see a laundry list of all the things you “won’t tolerate.” Save that for the third date or something. Project a positive attitude!
• Share as many of your interests in music, movies, foods, lifestyle, etc. as you can to make it easier to see if you have anything in common with your potential dates.
• Try to be unique – there are likely thousands of women on the site saying the exact same thing. What makes you different? True story: my aunt asked me to help rewrite her dating profile because she wasn’t getting much response. The problem? Her profile was 2 sentences long and it listed her interests as “shopping at the mall and watching TV.” Not very interesting!
• Don’t focus too much on your job and education as your primary attributes. Men don’t really seem to care much about that beyond the fact that you have a job and a degree.
• Don’t talk negatively about your previous relationships in your profile and how you’re looking for someone who “doesn’t play games.” That is a given on a dating site. No one wants someone who plays games. But if you put it in your profile, most men will think you’ve got “baggage.”

The Online Dating Process: Do’s & Don’ts

Here are a few more tips to maximize your online dating experience in terms of when/how to meet as well as safety concerns.

• If you’re interested in someone, send them a message. Winks, smiles, flirts, etc. won’t get responded to as much as an actual direct message or email saying you’re interested. I always use a brief “pick up line” message like “I think you’re cute/attractive/have a great smile. Where are you from?” Men seem to like it simple.
• Stay logged in to your profile all day if you can (even if you’re not at your computer). When people see you “online” they will be more likely to contact you because they think they’ll get an immediate response.
• Message back and forth through the dating site before agreeing to meet in person. Get to know him enough to where you can say you honestly would probably have a good time hanging out with this guy. But don’t make it an endless string of email tag – the point is to MEET and see if you have some real live chemistry.
• Talk on the phone first before you meet. A lot of people say to just go for it and meet in person, but I’ve found that you can tell a lot about a person by what they talk about over the phone. Many times, I get bored or get a negative vibe and realize that I actually DON’T want to meet the guy after all.
• Try to set up a date to meet within a week of the first communication. You both can get busy with work, etc. and you want to capitalize on the momentum!
• GOOGLE HIM BEFORE YOU MEET. No, really. Do it. I found out this guy was married by doing a simple Google search on his name. His wedding announcement had been listed in the local paper! You can do this even if you only have his name or phone number.
• Always, always meet in a public place. Drive your own car or take public transit and meet him there. You don’t wanna get stuck on a bad/weird date and your only way of getting home is the guy you can’t wait to get away from!
• Don’t choose a spot that’s too expensive (it’s usually fine if he picks it – my first date with one guy was to one of the most expensive restaurants in DC, but it was his suggestion and he treated!). Bring your own money – the man will NOT always pay and there’s also the embarrassing possibility of his credit card being declined (this happened to two of my friends). I always offer to split the bill, and while most men won’t allow me to pay, it earns me brownie points just for offering
• Do a free background check. I use pipl.com to dig deeper into a man’s information – usually just to verify some of the things he’s told me like his job, where he lives, etc. My experience is that if a man lies about one thing, he will lie about many things…
• Leave a paper trail. For many of my first dates, I email my mom the guy’s name, phone number, and address if I have it from my background checking. That way, if something happens to me, the police will know exactly who did it.
• Trust your gut! If a guy seems creepy, I stop ALL communication with him. My intuition has been right too many times for me to ignore it.

To me, most of these tips are basic ones that you would apply to any type of dating situation, but when it comes to online dating, women do need to be more wary and cautious. I mean, most of us would be less likely to feel the need to do a background check on someone we met through a mutual friend vs. a complete stranger we met online. All that said, I’ve pretty much used these same methods and precautions for years and have had great experiences with online dating. And I’ve never had any issues with psychotic stalker men!

What would you add to this post from your own experiences with online dating?

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